Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a numerical controller, and more particularly, to a numerical controller capable of performing a teaching operation for a plurality of programs for controlling a plurality of mechanism sections.
Description of the Related Art
In creating teaching-playback machine control programs, position information on a machine is recorded in a controller after the machine is moved to a desired position. If programs for mechanism sections are intended to be created by a single control panel based on this program creation procedure, however, a problem occurs that an operator cannot easily identify the mechanism sections for which the programs are created.
Even when the programs are displayed on a screen, moreover, programs for another mechanism section may be changed by mistake unless the operator is careful. For a program in which the positions of axes previously selected at the time of teaching are collectively recorded, an erroneous teaching operation may possibly be carried out with no regard to the identity of a program for mechanism section.
In order to solve these problems, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2-173808 discloses a technique in which erroneous input is prevented by simultaneously inputting identification data for identifying a teaching object when sequentially teaching a plurality of mechanism sections as control objects.
In order to control a plurality of mechanism sections by a single controller, the axes of the mechanism sections to be controlled are previously set in each program and positions may sometimes be recorded by a teaching operation. Since the teaching operation can be performed in the same manner without regard to the axes previously set in each program, programs for controlling mechanism sections against an operator's intention may be taught in some cases. According to the technique disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2-173808 described above, erroneous input is prevented by simultaneously inputting the identification data for discriminating a mechanism section for which the position is input. In this technique, however, the input contents are so many that operations are inevitably complicated.